UP THE RIVER OF TAPIRS 163 



that the birds save themselves and their young in other 

 ways. Some nests are inaccessible. From others it is 

 probable that the parents remove the young. Miller once, 

 in Guiana, had been watching for some days a nest of ant- 

 wrens which contained young. Going thither one morn- 

 ing, he found the tree, and the nest itself, swarming with 

 foraging ants. He at first thought that the fledglings had 

 been devoured, but he soon saw the parents, only about 

 thirty yards off, with food in their beaks. They were en- 

 gaged in entering a dense part of the jungle, coming out 

 again without food in their beaks, and soon reappearing 

 once more with food. Miller never found their new nests, 

 but their actions left him certain that they were feeding 

 their young, which they must have themselves removed 

 from the old nest. These ant-wrens hover in front of and 

 over the columns of foraging ants, feeding not only on the 

 other insects aroused by the ants, but on the ants them- 

 selves. This fact has been doubted; but Miller has shot 

 them with the ants in their bills and in their stomachs. 

 Dragon-flies, in numbers, often hover over the columns, 

 darting down at them; Miller could not be certain he had 

 seen them actually seizing the ants, but this was his belief. 

 I have myself seen these ants plunder a nest of the dan- 

 gerous and highly aggressive wasps, while the wasps buzzed 

 about in great excitement, but seemed unable effectively 

 to retaliate. I have also seen them clear a sapling tenanted 

 by their kinsmen, the poisonous red ants, or fire-ants; the 

 fire-ants fought and I have no doubt injured or killed some 

 of their swarming and active black foes; but the latter 

 quickly did away with them. I have only come across 

 black foraging ants; but there are red species. They at- 



